It's a Smallworld After All

A few months ago I got a copy of Smallworld by Days of Wonder. Probably as a result of having wiped the floor with them both in whatever we played that weekend, both K and M forbid me from even reading the rules until we all had a chance to sit down and try it together.

Finally, such a chance came around on Friday night. So after dinner, we cleared the table and lifted the lid. I was a bit amused by K and M asking was each component was for and what we were meant to do while I was still trying to set up the board - if they'd let me read the rules before hand I could have answered all their questions!

It took us a little bit to get started, but we got into the flow of things pretty well. We all agreed that K had the pointiest ears, so she got to start and chose the Heroic Elves. M went for the Skeletons with a power I don't remember, and I started with Wealth Skaven Ratmen. K quickly took one side of the board, and M took the other leaving me to squeeze in between them both.

The skeletons proved to be quite effective at claiming territory - mostly mine. So after about 4 turns I was the first to opt to go into decline and grabbed myself the Spirit Hobbits Halflings. Since the Hobbits can start the game anywhere, I popped up in the middle of the skeleton lands and started to clear out the undead infestation.

Shortly after, M decided to go into decline as well, and grabbed herself some Mounted Giants. Unfortunately, I don't think she quite realised that if you have a civilization in decline you can still get victory points for them, because she came into the board on some skeletons, and in her efforts to attack me wiped out a few more skeleton lands.

Meanwhile, K was mostly leaving us to fight amongst ourselves, but eventually decided she'd expanded as far as she could. So she picked up the Sorcerers (again, I forget their special power). She quickly started stomping all over the giants and my hobbits, so I decided to go into decline again.

I emerged as Commando Dwarves ("so they're not wearing any undies?" quipped K), and in the last two turns frantically tried to claim as many mountains as I could while watching my hobbits continue to be hunted down by K, who ended up winning comfortably.

I really enjoyed the game, and can see there's a fair bit of depth to be explored. I think we all held onto our civilizations too long - I should have gone into decline a lot earlier, especially since I didn't get anywhere near close enough to take advantage of the Spirit part of my hobbits. I'm also looking forward to seeing how the game goes in two-player mode.